Enjoy the rest of your life, Chuck
by Doc in Oz
Summary: Early season 2. Chuck realises that Casey and Sarah will have to kill him when the new Intersect comes online. Chuck must run for his life, with Sarah and Casey hunting him. Rated T for language. Spoilers for 2.01.
1. Chapter 1

-o0o-

As of 13 Mar 2012, I don't own Chuck et al.

**Spoiler Alert!** This is a longer, multi chapter version of one of my songfics – Cold Chisel's "Cheap Wine." If you've read it, well, you kind of know the ending.

As mentioned in that fic, I have liberated certain ideas from **coursejester**'s brilliant _The Second First Date._ And probably a lot from other fics too many to name or too lazy to recall.

* * *

><p><strong>Enjoy the rest of your life, Chuck<strong>

**Chapter One.**

-o0o-

_The other day,_

_Upon the stair,_

_I saw a man who wasn't there._

_He wasn't there again today,_

_I think he's from the CIA._

MAD magazine (circa 1976), variation on the poem by William Hughes Mearns

-o0o-

Director of the CIA, Langston Grahame's face contorted into a _bad_ taste. He tried to smile through the flat screen monitor in Casey's apartment as he leant over beside General Beckman.

"Enjoy the rest of your life, Chuck."

Chuck sat there, stunned into silence for one of the few times in his life. Was he hearing correctly? It was over? Just like that, and it was all over?

It was Casey who gave it away, when he glanced at Sarah for a split second. Sarah, noticed his movement, and after a fractional glance at the big man, turned around to face Chuck. The look she gave him, it wasn't the expression you shared with someone who'd received good news.

But it was only for a moment. Then her normal brilliant smile slipped effortlessly into place as if the horror struck moment had never happened.

But Chuck knew that it had.

Maybe the reason she looked sad was because if he was no longer the Intersect, then super spy Sarah Walker had absolutely no business being around one Chuck Bartowski.

It was a by now an all too familiar day dream, that she cared for him, that Sarah Walker actually cared and had feelings for him. Only now he'd go back to his old life. And she would have no valid reason to be a part of that life...

But of course, that would allow for the concept that a woman like Sarah could have feelings for a nerd like him. She was so far out of his league, he felt like it was high school all over again. Or high school on steroids, since no girl in school was even _close_ to Sarah.

And yet... there were moments...

Her behaviour on the rooftop when Longshore was about to extract him. It made him wonder if, because she _was_ a spy, maybe she _could _lie while Sodium Pentothal coursed through her veins...

But even more than that, it was little things...

-o0o-

A bit over three weeks ago, the Weinerlicious had closed for refurbishment. Sarah thus had time off during the day. She still came into the Buy More, bringing him lunch. Chuck loved how she pretended to hunt for him at the front of the store, even though he knew that she full well knew where he was the whole time. And that she knew that he knew that she knew. He loved it, because of the way she would smile at him when she 'found' him.

Chuck had mixed feelings about the temporary closure of the deep fried hot dog store. He certainly wouldn't miss the, well, whatever the hell it was that Sarah managed to crispy critter. He might be just a little bit past the halfway point of being totally head over heels in love with her, but his stomach was traitorously relieved at the close of the shop that smelled strongly of carbonised sausage. And smoke. And oil that was about half a degree below the flash point.

But he did miss the uniform. Oh, he could never tell her that, naturally. But that little short pseudo-Bavarian charmer did own a special place in his... lets call it his memory.

It wasn't quite a year ago... one fateful twenty seventh birthday. One he wouldn't wish on anyone, but also one he by now honestly couldn't have done without. It had brought many things into his life. Most unwelcome, except for one.

It had brought him Sarah.

The asshole who had fucked his life over once previously had managed to do it a second and magnificently glorious time. Only this time, the man he had once loathed had exceeded himself, and had died sending him secrets. Official government secrets. The kind of secrets that governments lock you up for, it they even suspect that you know about them. And that same government had sent the man who killed Bryce, to kill him. See? That was the alternative, so 'lock you up' was starting to look pretty good.

But it certainly wasn't what Chuck had voted for in the last election.

And the beautiful bombshell he'd been on a date with only an hour previously also turned out to be a spy. Along with also being the 'partners with benefits' of one Bryce 'I-fucked-Chuck-Bartowski's-girlfriend-and-life,-not-necessarily-in-that-order' Larkin.

Only Sarah hadn't told him that before he managed to fall for her. Which was probably shortly before the phone went 'clunk' on the desk when he first saw her, so, if he was honest with himself, he really didn't give her an awful lot of time for full disclosure.

Chuck did have some luck on that fake date night. He managed to stay out of a prison cell and/or the cold hands of the Grim Reaper, as personified by the NSA's agent, the Marine corp's Major John Casey.

And so, in a convoluted manner, Chuck acquired a fake girlfriend who had pointed a gun at him (sort-of) during the date, and was now also working side by side with that same Green Ripper, John Casey. The John Casey who had also pointed a gun at him (for real) that same night.

As dates go, this one was a doozy. Definitively in his top ten.

How did this happen? It was all going so... boring. He'd been stuck, Chuck knew that. He knew he'd needed a jolt. A nudge, just to get him over... the whole Stanford thing.

So, nudge? Yes. Being whammo'd from the side by the secret world of international espionage's personalised semi-truck trailer (featuring a spiky bull bar that came straight from a Mad Max movie)? Ehhh, not so much.

Much to everyone's surprise, and Chuck included himself at the top of that list, Chuck with help from Casey (muscle. And guns, lots of guns) and Sarah (beauty. And brains. And muscle. And guns. And knives) did pretty well. Somehow, they as a team had worked well, and had an impressive success rate.

And every day he worked alongside her, he fell a little deeper for Sarah Walker.

-o0o-

Casey and Sarah had recently started getting Chuck to review data from the CIA and the NSA. 'Dailies' they called them. It was pretty simple, if time consuming. Look over the files or recordings and flash. Tell someone about the flash so they can write it down.

Simple. Headache inducing, but simple. On Thursday, Chuck found the empty warehouse that they were using this week. Every few days, they moved location to a different creepy abandoned warehouse. Who knew there were so many of them? Sarah was waiting for him with the dailies, ready for him to review and flash. At least when it was Sarah, she didn't make him feel like he was just a cog in a machine, scan the document or photo or recording and flash, verbally spew the relevant data and proceed onto the next one. And then next one. And then the next one. Repeat as often as unnecessary. Hence the headaches.

When it was with Sarah, she made him feel like he was part of a team.

He sat on his low backed office chair, with Sarah to his left and began to review. Twice during the afternoon, she moved to get a folder on Chuck's right hand side. Despite the fact they pretty much had a couple of hundred square feet or so around them, she managed to _just_ brush his back as she leaned over to reach the pile of folders.

Chuck sat very still for a few moments, achingly aware of the fact that her tank top had grazed up against him. He was also achingly aware of the contents of said tank top that had almost been in contact with him for what felt like three seconds, it was probably shorter but it felt like an age, or not long enough.

He blinked a few times and then tried to resume work.

Her, "Chuck, did you just flash?" broke him out of his trance.

"...Um... no... well yes, but it was out of date," he made up quickly as he tried and failed to not turn pink. Studying the monitor furiously, he never saw her on-off grin.

His name, see? That was another thing. When Sarah said his name, she made it sound special, important. Casey, when he said 'Chuck,' he managed to make it sound like it should rhyme with scum. About two months ago, the third time she'd slept over, which was a whole 'nother world of something that desperately needed a name not yet invented, she simply smiled and said "Good morning, Chuck," when she saw he was awake.

Somehow, she'd made his name into a happy thing. That caused him several sleepless nights later on.

The way she would look at him, holding him in her gaze, or the way she would brush up against him, or adjust his shirt or tie when there was no one else around.

He noticed she liked to have her hand held at times when there was no need mission-wise. Practice, she called it. Cover maintenance. It was just a little thing, but the way her fingers curled into his, as if for comfort, or protection...

-o0o-

"Enjoy the rest of your life..."

Taken at face value, it was a nice thought.

Except, now that he thought about it, '...the rest of your life...' kind of implied a time limit. So it wasn't even a threat. It was a good bye. Chuck realised he wasn't even worth a threat from Graham.

They were going to kill him, Chuck realised. It was a death sentence, and Sarah had obviously figured it out, judging by the micro burst of horror on her face.

And Casey would be the one to pull the trigger.

Chuck had a very nasty thought.

If he was right, Sarah would be the one to distract him when the time came. And Chuck was honest enough with himself to acknowledge that she would succeed, she being Sarah, and he being Chuck. She was his blind spot.

After the video conference, it was awkward. Chuck felt trapped, and wanted to flee, but he had to try to be calm. And Casey, for once, Casey looked uncomfortable. Even the normally amazing Sarah looked nervous.

Chuck stayed seated for a little while. He felt unable to move without physically shaking. Casey backed away, and retreated to the kitchen. Sarah was stuck in a zone of attraction and repulsion around Chuck that balanced each other out. For the first time in his life, he saw Sarah fidget and seem unsure of herself, as she orbited his chair.

No-one had said a word since the conference call ended.

Twice Chuck tried to get up, each time, his nerves betraying him as his hands and knees shook uncontrollably. After what felt like ten minutes, he was able to stand without giving his fear away to the cameras he knew were watching him.

Eventually, Chuck was able to leave Casey's apartment without it looking like he was fleeing for his life. Sarah joined him as he headed into the courtyard. For the first time he could recall, Chuck didn't hear Casey make some snarky food based remark.

Outside, Sarah walked him the short stroll back over to Casa Bartowski. Neither of them felt the urge to hurry and he could feel the fear drain from him in her presence. She asked what he was going to do. Chuck still couldn't believe it was all over. He bantered with Sarah lightly about his girlish screams in the face of danger. Chuck thought she was being honest when she said, "Well, you could've fooled me."

They faced each other silently. The real conversation passed between them in their eyes, like the words of a song Chuck couldn't quite recall – 'So much is left unsaid.'

Sarah asked him, "So, what happens now?" breaking the moment, as she almost always did.

He was caught of guard. This was happening so fast, he had nothing really planned. The first thing that came into his mind was, "Well, I've got the Buy More..."

Sarah interrupted him, "Chuck, can I tell you something?"

He looked at her seriously. "Of course."

She smiled heart stoppingly, "You can do anything, I've seen you in action and I'm not just talking about the bomb defusing or the diamond stealing." Again, her smile captured him totally, and her tone changed to something a little more intimate, "I mean, anything you wanted, you could have."

Chuck dipped his gaze. Was it wishful thinking to believe she'd stressed that second 'anything' ever so slightly? Or to think she was looking at him hopefully? Wishful thinking? Part of him wanted it to be so, but then he looked into her eyes. Maybe it hadn't been wishful at all.

All he had to say was her name. She was the 'anything' he wanted. She was the only thing he wanted now. The way she waited for him with her lips slightly parted almost made him ruin everything.

All he had to say was her name.

This was driving him nuts. Sarah had always gone above and beyond to protect him. But would she defy orders?

One word, one name could ruin everything.

When they finally parted, there was no kiss, no touch. She held his eyes with her gaze for longer than an agent should her asset. That had stayed the same, at least. He watched her re-enter Casey's apartment, and pause at the door for a final look at him. They both shared a frowny smile.

He had to run. He wasn't ready, but he had to run. Now. The watch came off as soon as he was in his bedroom. He left though the living room balcony and over the railing into the garden.

He'd never felt more terrified in his life.

All of this was too soon, nothing was fully prepared.

Chuck left his life, his world behind him with his heart in his mouth. Fuck, he was scared.

-o0o-

Sarah slammed the door behind her and whirled on Casey. She didn't scream, but it wasn't at conversation volume either. "Casey, you can't just kill him!" she demanded.

Casey waited silently, allowing her to adjust. This was never going to be easy, but for her, he knew it would be worse. Infinitely worse.

She emphasised, "Chuck never wanted any of this. Of us! He was never asked, and yet he's done everything we've made him do! Everything! You can't just kill..."

"Walker, you're compromised. How many people have you killed..." he reminded her.

"Fuck compromised! This is wrong! You know it! Chuck's a good guy... he deserves better... better..." she struggled to keep her voice level.

Casey just looked at her fight the tears. In civilian terms she barely moved, but to the eyes of an agent, she was practically breaking down in tears.

"I like him too," he said quietly after a moment.

"Casey, please don't... I could..." her eyes darted this way and that as she tried to think frantically.

"Take him off the grid? Run? Make sure he never flashes again? Ever? Hide him, protect him from me? Or an army of men like me? Us?" he gestured to include her in this not-quite-so-theoretical army, "This is the life we chose, Walker."

"Chuck didn't choose..." she whispered. The couch hit her ass unexpectedly when her legs failed her without warning, "... he never chose any of this..."

Casey kept silent for a few minutes.

Eventually he told her, "You know what we'll have to do. It's not... Walk...Sarah. Sarah, it's not going to be easy. But it's the only way."

Her eyes glistened as she nodded woodenly.

"We're going to kill him," Casey said as gently as he could. "You know that the order is going to come."

-o0o-


	2. Chapter 2

As of 20 March 2012, I don't own Chuck et al.

I haven't posted for a while. I'd forgotten what its like to get a couple of pages of emailed reviews and alerts. Thankyou.

-o0o-

**Enjoy the rest of your life, Chuck**

**Chapter 2**

-o0o-

Chuck wasn't a hundred percent certain (being, as he was, slightly preoccupied by being extracted – from a déjà vu inducing rooftop, _again_ – although this time _not quite_ at gunpoint, although Chuck strongly suspected that gun-pointage was always still on the table), but he thought he heard her voice crack a little when she said, "We don't have to do this, this is a judgment call. Okay? We can just hold Chuck here until we know for sure."

"His cover was blown, he's gone."

"I will take full responsibility. Chuck is my asset. He's my guy. Just give us more time, please," Chuck noted a hint of pleading in her voice, one he'd never heard before.

And a year ago, Chuck would have never noticed Sarah's little change in posture, a rebalancing on her feet. Jeee-zus, was she preparing to pull a weapon on a fellow agent?

Sarah briefly wondered at the same thing. Was she so compromised that she would fire on another CIA agent? She sort of knew she'd fallen for the tall, curly haired, incredible man beside her. She even knew that Casey was aware of her feelings, since he was the one who'd said, "We, meaning _I,_ go get Lizzy, while you find Chuck."

When she double checked him, he'd added, "Well, don't make me change my mind."

Maybe Longshore had realised it too, since he grudgingly gave them, "One minute."

If it was a minute, it only felt like seconds. He was being brave, and even now, with his freedom about to come to a shuddering halt, he took the effort to compliment her, "... Of course you can, you're Sarah Walker, you can do anything." She tried to hold the tears back. No, she couldn't 'do anything.' Because she couldn't keep the man she loved free...

And then, the Pita girl joined the rooftop extraction party, and the matter was no longer up for discussion. Sarah fought, and Lizzy was at a disadvantage, but she didn't know it. She didn't know how far that wiener girl spy would go to protect her asset.

As the edge of the building came closer, Lizzy began to get worried, wiener spy chick was pretty determined... If they weren't careful, they might go over that ...

-o0o-

She stood, knee deep in muck, garbage and God alone knew what. She'd just stopped him from being carted off to be hidden in not just one, but two distinctly different types of bunker(s) for the rest of his natural life, and the stupid _idiot_ wanted to go crawling through an entire building's icky dumpster to look for an engagement ring.

Okay, so finding his sister's engagement ring was kinda romantic, and a Chuck thing to do. And because he was Chuck, he wouldn't hear of replacing the ring. The entire US government budget (well, not really, but she did have some discretion) at his disposal, but _naooou_, he wants the original.

He was lucky he found it, because she was this close to tapping his head on the rim of the dumpster. Tapping it with care and affection, naturally, but there was a very strong urge for tappage. Ugh! She really needed a shower, and some sleep. The shower phase would possibly require the use of a Brillo pad. This whole dumpster was just... gross. And sleep. She needed sleep. Seriously, months in Pakistan, desert warfare (spy style) and she'd slept better there than here in Los Angeles.

And to make damn sure her stupid asset didn't do anything stupid while she was asleep, maybe she needed to pin him down and sleep lying on top of him to keep him saf... She ran her fingers through her hair, almost tearing at it. _'I _really_ shouldn't think about Chu... my... _the_ asset that way.'_

-o0o-

On the way back to drop off the recovered ring, Chuck betrayed his urgency by almost getting the little Nerd Herder airborne.

Spies have 'trust issues' and pilots make bad passengers. Sarah was both a spy and a pilot.

So, to state the bleeding obvious, Sarah Walker generally made for a very bad passenger at this (or, frankly, any) speed. As her teeth rattled from the almost landing, she grabbed for the 'Jesus rail' over the door, and muttered, "Chuck..."

He was driving with a level of concentration she'd only previously seen on his face when playing some stupid video game, or while some cougar skank had him dancing a tango backwards. She rested her hand on his arm, to get his attention, "Chuck..." she began again.

He eased off the loud pedal, thinking that was what she wanted, and slowed down to Warp factor 2.

"Chuck," she said for the third time. Seriously, who else could fluster her so badly she needed to start a sentence three times? "We... I..." she breathed deeply. This wasn't going the way she wanted. Fourth time might be the charm, "The CIA tried to put you into..."

"Bunker," he said through gritted teeth.

"Yes," she nodded, "well, sometimes working for the government, orders get mixed around, or prioritized wrong..."

"Prioritized!" he interjected, "is _that_ what you..." he trailed off, obviously trying to calm down. He was angry, but he didn't want to be angry with her.

"Chuck, I know. And you know I'll never let that happen to you." She sat still, deliberately calming herself. She needed this to come out right, "Chuck, not long after I started field work, _my_ handler taught me the need for, and how to set up a safe house. Maybe we need to start training you. But... but off the record, OK?"

He glanced at her as he drove, not quite knowing what to think, "What are you saying, Sarah?"

"Well, the first thing, a safe house? No-one else knows about it, okay?. Not even a partner. Use cash, keep off the books as much as you can, but at the same time, bills must be paid, mail checked, it cannot look out of the ordinary..."

-o0o-

She might have dedicated her life to the CIA, the Greater Good and dear old Uncle Sam. That didn't mean she wasn't a girl. And there were times when he definitely noticed she was a girl. Usually at the most inconvenient time for both of them, but he did notice. But there were also times he didn't.

This was one of those rare in between times.

"Do you wanna?" she offered as she indicated the living room window to Chuck.

"What, spy? You..." he massively pretended to be shocked. Sarah Walker, wanting to watch his sister get engaged...

She bit the return smile back, and shoved him over to the window so they could see what they'd scrounged a dumpster for.

Ellie's happiness...

Something she herself had never previously thought she'd wanted, and would most likely never know, but...

Ellie looked absolutely radiant.

It was only catching the reflection of Casey's movement out of the corner of her eye that made her turn down his offer to join his family inside. "Oh, it's family time," she said reluctantly, a large part of her wanting to come inside. But she and Chuck were on thin ice as it was.

His honest, "I know," just made things worse.

After Chuck went inside, Casey joined her at the window. "We can only keep him here for so long," he muttered as the pair watched Chuck get hugged by his sister. "You realize that, don't you?"

She couldn't speak, the Hallmark Moment inside emphasising what would most likely never be hers.

The both decided any longer at the window, and even Devon and Ellie might notice. As Casey headed back to his place, and Sarah for her car, Sarah said, "I think we might need to start some training..."

"Walker, go home. Get some sleep, I've got him. And take a damned shower. You smell like garbage."

-o0o-

Orders. It was orders that made Chuck realise his situation.

Only hours before, Chuck had swooped down off the Buy More roof to save Sarah. He felt ridiculous in the white dinner jacket, but he hoped that – and sort of already knew that she would – Sarah would see the funny side of it.

Except Bryce picked that exact moment to come back and...

He didn't want to think about it. Which was kind of like, when he was a kid, being told to sit in the corner, and to 'not think about elephants.'

On paper, it was the only option. Bryce needed to touch base with the team, and at the same time, keep off the grid. So Sarah's place was really the only place for him to stay.

That didn't stop it from sucking big-time.

So for the next couple of days, and nights, Chuck didn't think about what Sarah and Bryce were doing. And he didn't think about them a lot. An awful lot.

He wasn't thinking about them when Bryce's face appeared on the Duck Hunt screen. He wasn't thinking about them when he shot the game controller at the flock of Bryce faces as they flapped across the screen. He wasn't thinking about them so much, that when he got up to wander over to Casey's just to have something to do, he didn't notice the 'high score!' flash on the screen.

Casey looked up from his paperwork, irritated at the interruption and at Chuck just for being Chuck.

"What!"

"I'm just... Casey, can I help with the paperwork, or something? I... I'm just..."

Casey stared at Chuck for long enough that in other times, Chuck would have started fidgeting as though he was in the terminal stages of St. Vitus dance. Or at least start verbally babbling something about Star Wars or sandwiches or some other goddamn crap.

The kid was hurting.

What the hell was Walker doing? Christ, even Beckman and Graham had suspicions about how she felt about the moron. And it was damned obvious to _everyone_ how he felt about her.

_Crap! I've been on this assignment too long. Bartowski's infected me somehow...'_ he thought.

He shoved a pile of paperwork, the boring financials, in Chuck's direction. "Here," Casey offered.

"What're these for?" Chuck wanted to know.

Casey repressed the instinctive grunt, and tried to be civil, "You know those fake IDs we use? Well, the fake ID fairy needs receipts."

Chuck looked through the paperwork, ran some quick sums in his head, "Casey, there's... it's over... Each ID looks like it's about a half-a-million dollars."

"Good fake ID fairies don't come cheap. But you can keep some of the background stuff in circulation. See, just a driver's license with a bogus address will call attention to itself. But you add in utilities and credit cards and shit, that house of cards holds up longer."

Chuck worked his way through the pile, and the pattern emerged. He began to see how it was done, and began making some notes after a bit, when he saw how he might streamline things.

After a bit over an hour, Chuck pushed the completed pile to the side. When he got a chance, he'd check with Sarah about his ID ideas...

Sarah...

Sarah and Br...

Oh well, he'd spent an hour actually not thinking about...

Why was Bryce alive? OK, well he sort of knew the answer to that one, but a bigger question was 'why was Bryce shot in the first place?'

"Orders," Casey said, as if Chuck had been a moron for asking.

-o0o-

Chuck figured out the next piece of the puzzle himself.

The Intersect computer. Yes, the first one had been destroyed when Bryce had remembered his birthday, _'And thank you for that, while you're at it, would you like to give me a nice paper cut and pour lemon juice on it?'_

But the plans would still be on file somewhere. And Occam's Razor led him to the conclusion that the government would build it again. After all, they were the government, and once you've made the first one, you know how to build it again. And the second time around will be cheaper, since you know what to do now. And that senator's cousin that got the contract in the first place would be pushing for another attempt. After all, he's got kids to get through college or a mistress to support.

And of course once you've got a real Intersect, this time around, inside the heads of real spies, then what possible use is one Charles Irving Bartowski, of the Encino Bartowski's?

OK, so he could end up in a bunker for the rest of his life. Not the best option, but for the cost of a single bullet, there was a much simpler and cheaper solution...

Orders... moron...

-o0o-

Because he fixed broken computers for eleven dollars an hour, Big Mike's much vaunted pay rise having not quite yet kicked in, Chuck knew how much patience people had for old and out of date computers. Not many five and a quarter inch floppies were still out there for some reason. Actually, he'd seen a documentary about an optical telescope that had ten years worth of data saved on a format of magnetic tape that just didn't exist anymore, so no-one could read it. It was as if for ten years, the observatory just hadn't existed.

No. Old and out of date computers were destroyed. If they weren't too old, some of the parts could be cannibalised, but he seriously hoped that wasn't an option for himself.

As soon as the new Intersect computer was up and running, Chuck was a dead man. And the problem with Occam's Razor is, it's very hard to find a happy alternative once you've found the simplest solution.

Chuck didn't want to be dead.

He began to think about how to run. When Sarah had sat beside him on the beach that first morning, he'd thought of the options available to him. And she'd gently confirmed his thesis. There was nowhere he could run. Not from them.

Even then, she'd been gentle with him, he realised.

But that was almost a year ago. He'd grown some in that time.

Fake identification and passports. Covert bank accounts. They were surprisingly good fun. Chuck had had fun when they let him help out with those. Once things between Sarah and himself returned to something approaching, for them at least, normal, he'd showed Sarah his ideas on improving the data rotation in the fake ID fairy files. She'd actually snorted with laughter at the acronym once she found out what the second eff stood for. It amazed Chuck when he realised what he would do, and how far he would go just to have Sarah do something as normal as snort with laughter.

She pitched it to Casey, and it was included in Chuck's 'to-do' list during the Dailies duty.

Once you knew how, it was depressingly easy, actually. Provided you had access to a whole bunch of government data bases, and a veritable black bag of money to fund it.

So, Chuck ended up with the task of creating covers for the team. He found he was good at it. Not just IDs, but whole covers, phone and gas bills interlocked with tax files, the dreaded permanent school records and parking fines, to make a whole fake life. A lot of it was never used, and he recycled. Chuck prided himself on keeping at least two covers in advance all the time. The truth was he had up to ten in advance most of the time. Once he realised what was going to happen.

Casey and Sarah were never informed about the extras he'd made. He'd moved more money than he ever thought existed into accounts for these covers, moving it back into the coffers once done.

-o0o-

Seven million dollars. That was what he figured he would need. And that was being frugal. Once upon a time, that figure would have been a fortune, enough for more than a lifetime. But after a few months, Chuck realised that it was practically pocket change to the agencies now running his life. Chuck was shuffling another eight hundred and seventy million around. It wasn't like he was stealing it, he had authorisation to create these lives.

Seven million sounded like a lot, but it wasn't. It was enough, and that was all. And that would probably only buy him five years at best. After that, he would either be dead or, he hoped, no one would care anymore. Option 'B' was Chuck's preferred option.

-o0o-

Casey knocked on the front door to Casa Bartowski.

"Hi John," smiled Ellie just inside her door, a little puzzled at Casey's presence.

"Is Chuck...?" Casey asked, wearing the Buy More green shirt. He mumbled something about being here to car pool with Chuck.

"I think he spent the night with Sarah. He wasn't here when we got home last night."

Casey kept his face still, "No problem, I must have forgotten."

As soon as the door closed he was on the phone, "Walker! Where's Chuck!"

Sarah answered on hands-free while she drove, "He's not with you? I haven't seen him since the briefing last night," her heart missed a beat. Chuck. "Have you checked his locater?"

Casey's growl indicated that naturally he had, first thing. "Shows he's in his room. Ellie says he was gone when they got home last night. Walker, I have to ask. Did you warn him?"

She hesitated, but she had to be honest, "No. I... I wanted to... after we left the briefing... No. No warning," she swallowed, audibly.

Casey hesitated too, "Could he have figured this out?" he asked in a quiet voice.

"Chuck's smart," she admitted, "I know you call him a moron, but you know that he's not. He's smart... the smartest man I've ever known..."

Grunt, "You're on your way in? Right. Meet me in the new base, the coms are up, they were testing them the other day. We need to advise ..."

"Casey we have to find him!"

"We're going to. Christ, this is a cluster-fuck."

-o0o-

**A.N. – **Yes, I know that according to cannon, the Bryce and the Montgomery scenes were _after_ the words 'enjoy the rest of your life.' Thus making this is anachronistic. Live with it. Life _is_ pain, princess; anyone who tells you differently is selling something. Besides, it works better with Bryce than that rich guy on the boat.


	3. Chapter 3

As of 27 March 2012, I don't own Chuck et al.

**Enjoy the rest of your life, Chuck**

**Chapter 3.**

-o0o-

**YARMOUTH (vb.) – **_To shout at foreigners in the belief that the louder you speak, the better they'll understand you._

Douglas Adams – The Meaning of Liff

-o0o-

Langston Graham, director of the CIA, was killed when a Trojan horse activated and blew up the newly, and only eleven million dollars over budget, rebuilt Intersect room, along with six (or five, depending on who you read and believed) agent/host candidates.

Dangerous thing, this Intersect computer. People died because of it. If it was up to Chuck, he'd have nothing to do with one. Only problem with that, he didn't have a lot of option regarding wanting to or not 'have anything to do with one.'

Curiously, Director Graham's death failed to make the news services. So did the death of the five (or six – again, the details were sketchy and reports differed) unnamed agents. Chuck was living in Germany when he read about the deaths. Strictly speaking, he wasn't supposed to have access to the server where he read the file(s) about the deaths, but then, there were lots of things he wasn't supposed to have access to.

Like, for example, Beckman's rescinding the termination on one certain Chuck Bartowski. Because he'd pre-empted them all and run, or as one of Casey's earlier reports had expressed it, 'shot through like a startled gazelle' before he changed it to a more government-ese appropriate 'absconded.' While there was a hand written termination proposal, there was no actual order. She'd changed the written order to 'seize and detain.' For the subject's own good, naturally.

So, it was bunker time for Chuck. Again.

And as it was a woman's prerogative to change her mind, that meant the bullet option could very easily come back into play once she had what she wanted, or got fed up with him, whichever came first.

He'd also read Casey's report of how Casey'd gone over to Casa Bartowski the morning after Chuck had done the gazelle. How there was no sign of the Intersect asset. The attached recordings from that night of them at the briefing (Chuck was pleased that he didn't look as petrified as he'd felt at the time), after the briefing – when Chuck wasn't there – and of Casey's call to Sarah the following morning when they realised that a certain Chuck Bartowski was absent without leave. Casey had sounded grumpier than his usual setting, and Sarah had sounded really scared. The attached notes from the analysts had noted Sarah's reaction to the morning phone call, and wondered if she'd been compromised. Under other circumstances, it would have been time for one of the Forty Nine series evaluations.

-o0o-

For the first time in longer than Chuck cared to remember, he was almost having fun, on this almost vacation. He set up a safe house, just outside Berlin, and spent some time touring Europe.

Age, that was the overall impression he got from Western Europe. Age, and war. There were castles, villages and chunks of whole cities that were built in the Dark Ages. The Romans even managed to rear their engineering heads once in a while. For a boy from a country where Billy The Kid was ancient history, to encounter buildings that pre-existed Columbus was... he wasn't sure what he should feel. Awe, certainly, but most of it was simply outside his experience, so he was slightly shell shocked.

And then there were whole swathes of the larger towns and cities that had been flattened during the 39-45 war. Some areas were still obviously hurriedly rebuilt just afterwards, and other areas had only been rebuilt relatively recently.

Castle battlements, and steel and glass towers. That was Europe to Chuck.

He really wanted to add some photos, and update his Facebook page. Almost immediately, he imagined a miniature Sarah Walker pop up on his shoulder telling him that was just a dumb idea. The more he thought about it, the dumber, and better it sounded.

Chuck did a Russel Crowe. Wearing the same sloppy joe advertising some (he guessed) football team he'd never heard of, he took several photos of himself, and then digitally stitched an image into a touristy scene, and then re-worked the filters so it wouldn't appear fake.

So, suddenly on the same day, and at the same time, his Facebook wall showed he was currently in Paris. And also in Cape Town, Auckland, New York, Beijing, the public library at some place called Beaver Creek, the Mardi Gras in Rio, New Orleans and Sydney (chrono-and-theologically impossible). He was tempted to add one of himself at the South Pole, but wimped out. The Bulldogs jersey would have been a giveaway that it was fake, what with all the snow and everything.

It took a surprising amount of time before the CIA and NSA noticed this, a curious oversight considering the resources now currently employed in the hunt for Bartowski.

When Bartowski's Facebook account was brought to her attention, General Beckman unwittingly quoted a famous courtside rant by John McEnroe, "You can _not _be serious!"

-o0o-

Chuck was back in the suburb just outside Berlin when a flash of blonde spooked him.

Ironic really, since the Germans seemed to pride themselves on their blondness. They were everywhere. Chuck liked the Germans. They were like Americans. Even if you didn't speak their language, they appreciated it if you made the effort to _try_ to speak German, they spoke louder, but they did appreciate the effort. And after two months, he was getting better.

Some of the stereotypes were as accurate as stereotypes can be, there actually _was_ an opera that did last for three or four days, and as far as he could tell, there was no word for 'fluffy.' But they certainly had a sense of humour. How could a nation with its own version of Top Gear be without a sense of humour? And from what he could tell, the German version was better than the US made one, but that wasn't ever going to be difficult.

He picked up a fair bit of German from TV. Watching the locally made Top Gear and the original South Park and Mythbusters dubbed into German was one of the oddest things Chuck had encountered, bearing in mind that a lot of his encounters involved Morgan time.

And who knew that Weinerlicious actually had restaurants in Germany? The female staff seemed to share Sarah's appreciation of the uniform from her expression, but didn't quite carry it off with Sarah's aplomb. Chuck ate an unburnt corn dog for the first time in his life. It frankly, wasn't much of an improvement. Maybe that was something else that Sarah had changed about him. The restaurant experience was interesting for Chuck. It was the same as Sarah's, but subtly different. Skewed in some unknown way. Maybe it was something simple, like the cup stack was in the wrong space or something. It left Chuck uneasy, and he didn't return.

She was on the corner, across from where he was living. Chuck didn't see her face, but he knew. Knew it was Sarah. It was like that when they went on missions. He could walk into a crowded room, and just _know_ where she was even before they talked on coms.

It was time to go. The apartment was nothing but a place to sleep, his next port of call was already set up. There was nothing important up there, and one of his ready bags was ready with the other car. Chuck slipped quietly into the parking garage where he kept that other car. It was in a different building.

Casey was inside Chuck's apartment three minutes after Chuck drove calmly down the strass in the five year old, second hand Audi. He drove calmly, but there was a pool of sweat at his back as he drove.

Casey and Sarah stood in Chuck's abandoned apartment, judging the evidence of Chuck's existence for the past couple of months. Casey spoke in a resigned tone, "He picked up some trade craft, I'll give him that."

Sarah looked at the same basic apartment, seeing the signs of a man living alone and simply. While it was obvious that someone had lived here, aside from the ready bag, and the pile of fake passports and detritus on the table, it looked like it was from an IKEA catalogue, and there was no sign of Chuck. Her old hotel room had had more evidence of Chuck, and he'd spent far less time in total in her room than in this place. Her poor Chuck, living here, but not living...

She shook her hear, to clear her thoughts, "Well, he's a quick learner, we know that," she agreed.

Sarah gave him one thing. She taught him how to do this. To her chagrin, he turned out to be better at creating the web of data than she was.

He never went anywhere without at least three exits available. That applied to coffee shops, cities and continents. He always had a minimum of three cover lives ready at any time.

-o0o-

When Chuck disappeared, Ellie had no idea what to do, or think. Her little brother was just _gone_. And Sarah was absolutely devastated. Ellie had always suspected that Sarah was a lot stronger than the image she projected, but Chuck's disappearance had completely gutted her. Ellie had never seen another person look so, there was no other word for it, _terrified_. Was this the real reason that their relationship was 'complicated?' That she had been scared of being abandoned? Ellie wondered at what the hell had been done to this girl to make her like this.

The police took notes, and interviewed Ellie, Devon and Sarah, along with Chuck's co-workers at the store.

And then they stopped. Chuck became a missing persons report, with no leads.

Ten days after Chuck vanished, on the morning Ellie had planned to go back to work, just to take her mind off things, Sarah knocked at the door.

"Hi Ellie, can we... can we talk?"

Over the past week, both women had taken to going out for coffee together. After Chuck's disappearance, this was the first time Sarah had set foot inside his home since those first horrible days.

Sarah knew from their previous meetings that Ellie was going back to work, and she watched he young doctor fuss about in the kitchen before bringing two mugs of instant coffee over to the table. Ellie thought she saw Sarah wipe her eyes and brace herself.

"Ellie," Sarah began, "did Chuck tell you I used to be from DC?" Ellie nodded, and Sarah continued, "Well, I know some people in... law enforcement. You mustn't think for _one second_ that I'm giving up on... Chuck."

Ellie had to sob a laugh at that, "Oh, sweetie, I know, I mean everyone can _see_ how you feel about my brother."

"Ellie, I can't just sit here. I have to do something. I'm... I'm going to go back to Washington, and see what I can get started there."

Ellie looked at Sarah for a ten second count, before taking both of Sarah's hands in hers and saying in a flat, even tone, "You bring my brother home safe. The both of you."

-o0o-

At the six month anniversary, Sarah and Casey were following a strong lead that he'd been seen on the Italian Riviera, near the French border. She wondered if he'd made it to Rome. She loved Rome, and wanted to show him her favourite places in the eternal city. Paris too, she knew he'd always wanted to see Paris, his Facebook page not withstanding.

Shit! She just wanted to be with him. It didn't matter where. Him, he was central, the location was incidental.

Sarah's phone rang, the call ID showed it was from Washington DC. "Sarah Walker," she said as she answered it. If she'd been secure, she would have replaced her first name with 'agent.' This way, whoever answered knew if she was secure or in public.

"Ms Walker, you have a voice mail on your domestic cell number," said the disembodied voice. "You should listen to it, we have a problem."

On hearing the word 'problem,' she gave a warning look to Casey. The large man raised his eyebrows and when she was free of the phone grunted, "What?"

"We need a secure line."

It took an hour to get back the village, the time grating on her nerves. The pair returned to Casey's hotel room and he organised a video call on the computer to the tech support. The tech sent the message to Sarah's current phone while he stayed on the line with Casey. Sarah played the message on speaker.

Her heart seemed to have leapt into her throat when she recognised the voice, '_Sarah, this is Ellie... Sarah Walker of the Central Intelligence Agency, is _that_ even your real name?'_

Sarah looked horrified at the phone sitting on the table. But despite her expression, Ellie's voice didn't stop, _'I don't even know what to call you...'_ there was a muffled sound, like sniffling, over the line, before the message continued, _'... You lied! You lied to me. Worse, you lied to... you lied to Chuck! He's gone... and you... you... you have something to do with it, I know. He told me,'_ Sarah and Casey exchanged looks, _'he told me everything, and... and you know the funny thing? He's not even mad at you. He loves you, he LOVES you!'_ Ellie's voice distorted with her screaming the repeated words, there was another muffled sound that Sarah identified this time as Ellie blowing her nose, _'He loves you, and you... Do you even know what love is? You really had us fooled, whatever you name is...'_ the message ended with some indistinct noises, and then a very clear sobbing sound, cutting off mid sob.

Sarah sat there breathing deeply, before getting up quietly and searching for a box of tissues. Casey moved the screen to change the angle away from Sarah, and said quietly to the tech, "We'll need a few minutes to... I'll call back in five," and shut the clamshell of the laptop. He glanced at Sarah, and then got up saying, "I need to stretch my legs, I'll uh... I'll be outside for a bit."

She didn't cry. She used up a wodge of tissues, but she didn't quite cry.

When Casey rejoined her, she nodded that she was okay, and he reconnected to the tech.

"As you can see, we have a problem," said the tech. "We've traced a number of messages that were sent to Dr Bartowski this morning, local time. They were stored on a server in Azerbaijan more than six months ago, timed to release today."

"Six months? That was before..." Casey said.

"Yes," said the tech, "He planned this, to give a message to his sister before he ran. Now, did he set it up to release today, or did he have it on a hold, sending a message to keep it on hold, and setting it up to only send the message if he missed a delaying call? If so, that could mean... that could mean he's dead."

"NO! No, he's _not_ d..."

Casey overrode Sarah, "You said 'messages,' there was more than one?"

"All sent together, encrypted rather elegantly. We're still working on the encryption. His sister had to answer some questions about a charm bracelet and something about a card game, we'll send you the list, see if you have any suggestions. From the sizes the files he sent, we think they were text based documents, about ten pages all up."

"We're rather thinking he found some background information about the project and sent her some of the files. Probably enough for an outline, certainly not all he details," came a different, familiar voice.

"General Beckman!" exclaimed Sarah.

"Agents. It would seem our Mr Bartowski has been very clever. While we have a good idea of _when_ the message was saved onto that server, _how_ he placed it there is another story. I rather suspect," and the timbre of her voice changed as she gave someone, or rather, a roomful of someones, a _look_, "that we have some sort of a mutual geek appreciation society. They keep talking to me in gobbledygook, but the gist of it is, whatever it was he did, it was apparently clever."

"Yes General," said Sarah, with no hint of emotion in her voice, despite her urge to grin like an idiot.

"Hmm. I've got a team heading to Burbank to contain Drs Bartowski and Woodcomb. We need make damn sure she understands the implications of revealing any information she thinks she might have."

"General..."

"Oh relax agent Casey. Agent Forrest will be diplomatic."

-o0o-

A pattern of his movements emerged. If he'd been an agent gone rogue, the pattern might have been noticed earlier, but all the records indicated Bartowski was a civilian asset with zero training. He never 'painted himself into a corner.'

Some countries that had populations where a six foot four, gangly white guy with an indoorsy complexion might have blended in, South Africa, Australia and New Zealand were just not available to him. They were dead ends, countries at the end of the line.

He also had developed a nasty habit of zigging when everyone expected him to zag. And then doubling back. Twice he used addresses after they had been blown. That was something no trained agent would ever do. Neither would they continue to update their Facebook page. He posted new photos roughly once a month (undoctored as far as the tech-heads could determine) of himself in various cities all taken simultaneously and obviously that just wasn't possible.

But the one that _really_ got the General's goat was his blatant use of public transport. Owing to the nature of public transport and the unique interpretation it as an industry has of timetables, it was impossible to predict his movements.

All he seemed to do when he found a place to settle was live quietly. His neighbours, when they remembered him, all said he was quiet, kept to himself, and the few single females interviewed all said they thought he looked sad about something.

He also had a nasty habit of determining whatever cell phone number Sarah was currently using, and sending a text message via a complex internet route. Once a month, her phone beeped, and his message was the same, _'I'm sorry. C.'_

-o0o-

A surprisingly large part of the world was off limits to him, bottle neck traps. Islands were an option only when there were exit strategies open. Indonesia and The Philippines kept him alive for three months, because there were so many islands. Chuck gained muscle mass from his job on a tourist dive boat. His skin darkened in the sun. He would have liked to try Hawaii, but it was too isolated. Another trap.

Chuck enjoyed working the dive boat, his knowledge of dive instruction coming from Devon, the Internet and James Bond movies. The Internet and Devon were more useful, obviously. He enjoyed SCUBA diving immensely, and regretted not having done it before. And because this was a destination diving area for reef and wrecks, he didn't actually have to teach anyone how to dive, they all came, usually with full dive logs, and more experience than Chuck had. After the three months, he decided it was time to move again.

In Washington DC, he got a job in the IT department of one of the FBI branches.

-o0o-

**A.N. – **Doing a Russel Crowe, when Rusty got arrested for the phone throwing incident, he purposely wore the same football jersey (for a team he doesn't own, and definitely doesn't follow) in every paparazzi photo of his arrest and subsequent release. Just to mess with the minds of the magazine editors.


	4. Chapter 4

As of 03 April 2012, I don't own Chuck et al.

(When you get to the end of this chapter, please bear in mind I'm mostly a shipper. ...Mostly...)

-o0o-

**Chapter 4.**

Chuck loved working for the Feebs. It was just about the only job he'd had that he was good at, was appreciated by his peers and superiors and as a bonus, Chuck actively liked doing the job. Sure as shit paid better than the Buy More, the CIA and the NSA all combined.

He found himself with a good team, keen, professional and despite the role models he'd seen on TV, they reminded him of himself – these boys and girls had fun. Chuck tried not to, but he found himself part of a team for the first time since Stanford (if he ignored working with Sarah and Casey).

He was sorely tempted to find an 'I want to believe' UFO poster for his office – a little X-Files humour, which the FBI was actually pretty good about. In the end, he decided not to, he couldn't be too memorable.

He was able to put the Intersect to use for the first time in almost a year. Initially by accident, he saw an email while he was massaging the network firewall, and the image of a wanted arms dealer caused him to flash. Getting the relevant data to the agent was a bit more problematic. Dragging out his 'creating fake IDs for fun and profit' skills, Chuck created an Agent J. Walker, from the New York field office (he photoshopped one of Devon's photos – Captain Awesome looked good in a suit, who knew?), Chuck created a trail that was able to lead the agent in charge to the arms dealer.

After the first one, it was almost easy. Chuck smiled to himself, the New York agent Walker was getting a reputation for good solid leads. He didn't go out of his way to find bad guys, but if a flash occurred during his 'routine' check of the building's LAN server, well, it was his civic duty to do something about it.

-o0o-

It was in DC that Sarah and Chuck actually saw each other for the first time since Burbank, a time frame that was longer than it took for normal couples to marry, babies to be conceived, gestated and get delivered all wrinkled and complaining about the indignity of the whole process.

Chuck left the building, and was headed home (for the moment). It was a nice day, he was feeling good, he had a couple of good contingencies ready, just in case. He was enjoying his actual job and he was good at it. He'd finally agreed to join the team for after work drinks, and was heading home to change before going back out to see how many beers he could hold onto.

At the crossing, he waited for the lights. Four blocks later, as he neared the Mall, he saw her.

They stood, frozen about ten feet apart, blocking the sidewalk as they stared in disbelief at each other.

She mouthed his name, "Chuck..." and he heard her clearly.

"Sarah... I..." he whispered back, before realisation set in, and he bolted for the Mall underground, his 'Tyrell Corporation' messenger bag thumping his hip and back the whole way.

After a heartbeat, she followed. He ran through the wide access, dodging wandering pedestrians and shoppers like they were slow moving mobile barriers. She lost him in the Mall proper.

She stood in the middle of the arcade of shops and milling customers, running her hands through her hair in frustration. She whirled around frantically looking for any sign of him.

_There!_ The translucent plastic doors to a service corridor were still swinging. She ran at them, shoulder charging her way through. Nothing... wait... there, the end of the corridor there was a fire escape door just coming to a close. She continued running, grabbed for the heavy smoke door and rushed into the fire stairs.

In the fire stairs, there was a small atrium for the stairs coming up from below, a security camera focused on the door and the exit corridor off to the right. She rushed the corner, and into the corridor.

Ten feet from the corner, he was waiting for her. She didn't slow, and threw herself at him. He was waiting with his arms ready for her and was kissing her desperately as soon as he was able to.

God it felt great just to hold her. She clung to him like a limpet, her whole body pressed close and trembling as she returned his kiss with equal desperation.

Eventually, the world returned to them, and she pulled back to breath heavily and finally utter, "God, I've missed you."

"I know, me too. You okay?" he asked, still gasping as he rested his forehead against hers, still holding her tight with one hand and running his other tenderly along her back, hair and then her face.

She nodded, and then realised something with a grin, "You startled me, I forgot to advise Casey."

"He close?"

"Yeah, I guess I can let him know in a few minutes..." she gave him a knee melting gaze, before asking, "Where will you go?"

Chuck mentally ran through his contingencies quickly, the one that felt best was, "Israel," he said with a shrug.

She nodded, as she focussed on his second from the top shirt button, the first one had come loose for some reason, and as she fiddled with it, she asked, "You know the beta blew up?"

Chuck nodded back, "Killing Graham. I saw. So Beckman's in sole charge now?"

"Uh huh, she changed the order to, and I quote, 'get that asshole back, we need him.'"

Chuck grinned, "That wasn't what the written order said..." but then he sobered, "Sarah, this is harder than I thought."

"Tell me about it. When you told me, I thought that doesn't sound too bad, but..."

He nodded in sad agreement.

Her issued phone rang while she had him pinned against the corridor wall, her mouth pressed open against his. She answered it before it went to message bank, but only just.

"Agent Walker..."

'_Walker, where the fuck are you?'_ came through very clearly. She didn't need to say Casey's name, everyone who knew him would recognise that voice.

"I spotted him going into the Mall, but he gave me the slip."

The voice from the phone was quieter now. Chuck couldn't hear what Casey said, but Sarah smiled up at him.

"Okay, I'll meet you at the west entrance," she hung up the call, and then smiled sadly at Chuck. "Time to go."

He nodded sadly as well.

She kissed him again, less hungrily this time, and whispered while she kept her lips to his, "Be safe."

"You too," he replied. "I'll speak to you, 'bout a week's time, on the burner cell."

She nodded.

Just as she was about to go around the corner, he said, "Hey."

She turned to face him with a questioning look.

"I was just thinking, it's a shame, I liked this job..."

She gave him a sad face as an apology before she left him.

Chuck went back to his place, and decided to skip the after work drinks. He did shower and change though. He even went out, he just didn't come back.

Two days later, she and Casey found his apartment. As before, the place was devoid of personality. His department heads and own staff were disbelieving at first when they were told he was a wanted man.

Quiet and a very good worker was the general consensus. He ran a good department, had excellent people skills and had set up some very good electronic search systems. Nothing he'd done was consistent with being a wanted man.

-o0o-

In Israel, he even used his own name, Bartowski. Sarah smiled when she found out. Even Casey grunted an amused noise.

Beckman released her inner John McEnroe again, "You can _not_ be fucking serious!"

-o0o-

Sometime near the eighteen month anniversary, agents Casey and Walker were summarily ordered back to Washington by General Beckman, for an update on the search for Bartowski. The General had passed beyond 'wild and livid' some time back and while not quite yet in the 'calm acceptance' phase of a modified Kübler-Ross stages of 'pissed off with Chuck Bartowski,' she didn't actively yell at them.

But on the whole, it wasn't a fun three hour debrief. In a nutshell, no-one knew for certain where Bartowski currently was, and the data he'd sent his sister had given her enough ammunition to be difficult. She'd stood toe to toe with agent Forrest, detailing exactly what had been done, without permission, to her brother and then had the unmitigated gall to blackmail a General of the United States Airforce (who also happened to also be the head of a clandestine government agency). Beckman was facing down the barrel of a credible risk of a full congressional inquiry, given the current administration.

Sarah just wanted to curl up and sleep. She was frustrated, tired and she missed Chuck. She hadn't seen him since they were last in DC, almost nine months ago.

The cabbie dropped her off, one block from her place. Old spy habit, check out your surroundings before entering. Nothing important, there were no dark tinted cars with large men inside lurking on a stake out.

Her local Blockbuster had closed down, however. That made her sad, because videos (along with a plethora of other stimuli) made her think about Chuck. If there were no videos, then Chuck would ... she stamped on the train of thought. _I can't let everything remind me of him._

The doorman at her building greeted her with almost no sign the she'd been absent for almost three years, "Welcome home Miss Walker."

While he didn't know what she did for a living, she'd been away previously for odd lengths of time, nothing as long as this, and he'd not said anything. It was Washington after all, the town was full of government employees.

"Thank you," she replied and started to head in.

"Oh, Miss Walker, your young man is inside. He had your key and your note." She froze. "I hope you don't mind my saying, but I like this guy. He's a bit out of the box, but I think you found a good one."

Her blood turned to ice, and she forced herself to turn and face him with a safe smile and replied, "Thanks."

She rode the elevator up, and got off on her floor. Ryan the doorman would notice if the elevator went to the wrong floor, so no opportunity to go past and come back down the stairs. She poked her head into the stairwell anyway, just in case. There was nothing there.

With keys in one hand, her other hand on the grip of her Smith and Wesson tucked into the back of her skirt and her heard thumping so loud, she was sure whoever was inside could hear it, she opened the door to her apartment.

Everything looked okay, but there'd obviously been someone there. It was light and the windows were open, so there was a nice breeze through the living room. She advanced into her place, the S&W now free since she'd closed the door silently. She looked around, while she was a tidy person, the place was _clean_. She seriously doubted that any lurking ninja assassin would have dusted.

Naturally, she almost shot him when he came around the corner, white headphones buzzing with some song he was listening to.

"Chuck!" she cried in relief as she aimed the S&W up at the ceiling while she thumbed the catch back to safe.

He stood there with that classically adorable 'chipmunk caught stuffing its face in a bakery' expression of his as he summed the situation up neatly, "Uh..."

She yanked the ear buds out of his ears (ignoring his indignant, "Ow!") and hissed to him, "What the hell do you think you're doing? I taught you better than that, Chuck!"

To her increased annoyance, he smiled.

"Sarah, I, uh, I flashed on the doorman downstairs. Actually, I flashed on the whole building. Aside from a certain black ops project regarding the human brain and super computers, he and the other doormen for this place, have a higher clearance than you do. Most of this building works for a whole alphabet soup of federal agencies. I think outside of my famous bunker option, this is probably the safest building in the continental U.S."

Now it was her turn to imitate a guilty chipmunk. "Uh..."

"Oooh Esss Marshals, you know, hen house, out house and dawg house."

"But, then they've seen you! Your face will be..."

Again, that irritating smile appeared. She'd really have to do something about that. "You underestimating my skills with a keyboard, Miss Walker?"

She recognised that twinkle in his eye. He'd done something spectacular, clever or stupid. Possibly all three. "Oh God... What did you do?" she asked in a resigned tone, half dreading the answer.

"I uh... remember Firefly? Okay, okay. Well, I used an image of the captain to replace mine. Only I couldn't use footage of him as a Browncoat, so I found something from a TV cop show he's done recently. Geez, he's packed on the beef though. So..."

She tucked her silver .45 away, in her waistband, "Yes, you're very clever."

She advanced on him, and he was suddenly very aware of the presence that was Sarah Walker.

This was everything he'd wanted, and yet, he hadn't expected to feel so nervous. Not that they'd had a lot of moments, each of those had been hurried and ... despite being a form of declaration of love on both their parts, nothing had ever been said. Even their conversations and messages using her burner hadn't used the word, but the meaning was there. Desire was obvious, but love? He thought so, and frankly he'd take whatever he could get from Sarah.

And then she put her arms around his neck, and looked deep into his eyes. He realised she might be just as nervous as he was...

"Chuck," she croaked, her throat now suddenly dry, "you do you realise this is the first time we've been alone and off camera for longer than five minutes?"

He swallowed what seemed to be a small bucket of sand, and nodded silently. The sand seemed to have changed into butterflies by the time they bounced off the lining of his stomach.

"Sarah, I've..." he waved his hands futilely at the kitchen, "I've got dinner already started..."

"I think we can get pizza or something," she muttered just before she kissed him.

Eventually, he got the idea.

So, considering the urgency that they had, trying to get to the bedroom, it took them a surprising amount of time to actually get there. But to be fair, neither of them were really concentrating on direction, or even bothering with keeping their eyes open for most of the journey. Which would explain the bumping into doors, walls and occasional furniture. The trail of clothes grew thicker as they finally did manage to find the bedroom door.

-o0o-

Afterwards, she propped herself up on an elbow, and ran her fingers through his chest hair. "Thank you," she said queitly, smiling at him.

"I'm pretty sure, speaking as a nerd, that's supposed to be my line," he smirked.

She grinned back and rolled closer to hug him, "No, I had a bad day, I needed this, I needed _us_."

He wrapped his spare arm around her, "Anytime," he said. Then in a more serious tone he asked, "So what happened?"

"Oh, just Beckman yelling at us. I think you using your real name in Haifa put the cherry on top."

"Me!" cried he in faux outrage, "I was a victim of identity fraud!"

"Yeah, well be careful, Beckman changed her order to 'any condition' for your capture."

"'Any condition' huh? Well, there was this certain condition you captured me with about ten, fifteen minutes ago..."

-o0o-

It was four months later, and back in Los Angeles, that Chuck Bartowski was killed. As he'd thought all those months ago, Sarah distracted him. He'd left his apartment, and was on the back street behind the building when he almost bumped into her. They spent almost a minute lost in each others eyes, unable to speak.

In the end though, she did give him warning.

"Casey," she breathed, looking over Chuck's shoulder.

The shot hit him in the back of the head. It was clean, nearly painless and nearly instantaneous. As he fell, she caught him with her name being shaped by his lips.

Casey looked down at the beautiful blonde woman, who had collapsed at the same time as her one-time asset, and was cradling the man she loved, with tears streaming down her face. She held his head in her lap, her hands and lap covered in deep red cranial blood.

Slowly, he holstered his weapon, and pulled his phone out and after thumbing the screen for the number, he said quietly, "It's done. Bartowski's dead."

His eyes never leaving the woman whose tear filled eyes didn't move from his.

-o0o-


	5. Chapter 5

As of 11 April 2012, I don't own Chuck et al.

-o0o-

**Chapter 5.**

Brig. General D. Beckman (USAF), director of the National Security Agency threw the report at her desk, where it slid to and over the edge falling to the floor. Pages fluttered from the cover on their way to the carpet, the ones that landed face up were stamped in red, with the words 'Top Secret' and 'Eyes Only' across them. About half of those visible had coffee mug rings on them.

She was fed up with the whole damned mess. Burbank, the Intersect project, Larkin, Walker, the CIA, even Casey. And Bartowski. Especially Bartowski! She was sick of the whole damned Bartowski family. That bitch of a sister hadn't gone quietly along with the program. That idiot civilian asset had sent her enough ammunition to make this all very embarrassing, and she then had the hide to blackmail the NSA. That was another stupid thing, if you're going to blackmail the government, think big. All she was after was enough to pay off her apartment and student loans, hers and her fiancées.

A new and improved Intersect computer had been built. The host agents now had physical skills included with the download. So far, two of the hosts were locked in agency psychiatric hospitals on serious medication. It would seem there might be a problem with the version two Intersect...

All of that, and only at a cost that gave the International Space Station funding a run for the taxpayer's money.

Money! The damn forensic accountants had dragged things out too. Bartowski had been clever, but seven million is accountable to someone. His handlers had been worse, during the hunt, it had cost over thirty-five million. The damned accountants had it figured out to the penny. One of the accountants had made a foot note, there was roughly three million undisclosed from Walker and Casey's hunt, which was well within the allowable losses for black ops missions. And then the accountant had the hide to point out that when Bartowski had handled the finances for the team previously, the 'acceptable losses' ratio was far lower.

Bartowski. If he wasn't dead, she'd have had him killed.

And just like Bartowski, the program was dead. Both of the handlers were compromised, Walker was so far gone, she needed therapy and Casey had opted for early retirement. Neither would ever be fit for field work again, according to the psychobabble. One shrink had admitted it was a challenge, and then verbally described Walker as, "Broken beyond repair."

'_I need a drink,'_ she thought.

The review panel recommended Walker be retired on full benefits. How the fuck did some half witted geek in a big box store break Langston's wild card enforcer? Now that she had all of Casey's notes and video files, it was obvious that Walker had compromised herself. She'd been gone for the asset, and almost from the very beginning! And Casey had damn well _covered_ for her. If he hadn't retired, Beckman would have fired him.

The shrinks were amazed that Walker had been functional at all during the hunt for Bartowski. And Casey was done too. While he hadn't been in love with his asset, but he'd been compromised in his own way. He might have pulled the trigger that killed Bartowski, but it was unlikely he'd ever pull another one again.

The body had been positively identified by both agents, and Beckman had received a charming little note from one of the head-shrinks looking after Walker regarding that little scene. Independent DNA tests confirmed it was him. Not that there'd been much doubt, neither agent was capable of deceiving anyone ever again. Walker, in particular had made it extremely clear just who it was that was on the slab.

The video of the now gaunt Walker simply falling bonelessly to the floor and sobbing quietly was one of the most heart wrenching things Beckman had ever witnessed.

-o0o-

Sarah Walker ceased to exist almost the moment the psych board released her from the CIA. She became Sarah Irving, almost legally. The documents would stand up under any scrutiny, and that was what mattered.

She moved to the only place that existed for her anymore, Echo Park. While the psychiatrists hadn't been particularly happy about her choice, there was no real medical objection. As the NSA no longer had need for it, the deeds to Casey's old place were signed over to the new Sarah Irving.

Ellie Bartowski spotted her new neighbour almost immediately as she was moving in, and cried out, "Sarah!" in a pleased voice before her whole body language slammed down to neutral, and Ellie turned on her heel and went back inside her place, as if Sarah had been invisible.

Sarah stood, obviously shaken by Ellie's reaction, but there honestly was nowhere else on the face of God's earth she could live. Practically from the moment she'd met him, Chuck had been her home. That night, when she saw both Devon and Ellie were home, she went over and knocked quietly on the door.

Ellie just stared at Sarah, standing in her door way. Neither said anything, but after a moment, Ellie stepped aside and allowed Sarah in. It took three bottles of red, a box of tissues each, and the night ended with Devon carrying Sarah to Chuck's cold bed, for the two to come to an arrangement. The one real question was, "Did you ever really love my brother?" Sarah's response was so obvious there was no need for words.

Chuck might have been dead, but Sarah loved him, and that made up for a lot in Ellie's eyes.

-o0o-

Weeks dragged into months. Sarah found a job. The gym she was using needed a backer, so using some of the left over funds from the hunt for Chuck (she figured the government owed her), she invested, and then found herself the owner of a gym that somehow turned itself into a martial arts studio.

She laughed for the first time in ages at the thought of what Chuck would say at her teaching self defence in her little dojo. Purely by accident, she became popular with the movie studios. Even before The Matrix, movie audiences had loved realistic fight scenes. It began when two guys wandered into the place, she didn't know it, but they worked as stuntmen. Sarah was impressed when she found out what they did, having assumed that all stunt guys were juiced up, muscle bound thugs. They explained to her that no, the actors they replaced in the fight scenes were rarely Sly or Arny type builds, so fight guys like them usually had to look like an average build. They were impressed with her skill and style. Soon, she was teaching famous actors the meaning of pain.

It took a few weeks, but she and Ellie were talking again. That was a good thing, because Sarah had missed Ellie as a friend, even if she was sort of a fake one. Sarah's last official contact with the spy world was to sign that all NSA equipment had been satisfactorily removed from the Echo Park complex. She smothered the giggle when she saw that there was even a 'satisfied with our service' tick box. She left that box blank.

When she came over to Devon and Ellie's one Sunday night, near the end of dinner she said quietly, "El? It's almost time. Two years."

To Devon's amazement, his fiancée _squealed_ and ran to throw her arms around the other woman, and with a huge grin demanded, "When?"

Sarah looked down and smiled slightly, "Soon."

Both women smiled happily. Devon stared in confusion at the pair of them, "What's going on?"

Ellie looked at Sarah, who nodded and then both women smiled at him. "Devon," Ellie began, "it's..." she turned back to Sarah, saying with a smile, "You know? Now I get the 'it's complicated.'"

"Devon, Chuck's alive, and he'll be back home soon," Sarah told a increasingly bamboozled Devon.

"Sweetie, Devon? It's true. I'm sorry I couldn't tell you, but it needed to be done until Sarah told me that the surveillance was removed." Again, Ellie turned to Sarah and asked, "Was this what Chuck went through?"

Sarah nodded, "Something like it."

One word bounced back-and-forth through Devon's mind, "Surveillance?" In here? That was just nonsense, like saying nuclear bomb or something. The word existed, it's just, it had nothing to do with normal life. "What... what's going on? Is this anything to do with why you were mad at Sarah a while back?"

"Sort of, Sarah's a spy."

"Was."

Ellie nodded acceptance of the correction.

After a lot of facial contortions, most of which looked painful, Devon admitted, "I'm... I'm confused."

"Devon, I was assigned by the CIA to protect Chuck. And then something happened that put Chuck's life in danger from the very people who were supposed to be looking out for him."

"Chuck?" Devon wanted confirmation. Clearly, Sarah had made a mistake.

"Chuck," confirmed Sarah, "Chuck became important to the federal government by accident. And being the amazing man he is, he was really, really good at it."

"Chuck," emphasised Devon again. Something wasn't right here...

"Chuck," smiled Sarah. "And about two years ago, the order came, or it was obvious it was _going_ to come, for us to kill Chuck."

"'Us?' There's _more_ of you?"

"My partner, John Casey."

John Casey, Devon knew that name from somewhere... wait, wasn't he the big silent type from across the way, worked at the Buy More for a bit... "Wha..."

"Devon! Honestly. Sorry Sarah, that's the man I'm going to marry," said Ellie in mock pride.

"Well, at least he's not screaming at me, like you did when I first told you," Sarah smiled sadly up at Ellie.

"Kill Chuck..." Devon tasted the words. It was like fish flavored ice-cream, it just didn't quite work.

"I worked for the CIA, Casey was with the No Such Agency. We were both assigned to Chuck. And then they built, or rather rebuilt the machine that would do what Chuck could do. As soon as the new computer was up and running, we knew they would kill Chuck."

"Because of what he knew..." hazarded Devon.

"Close enough. That's how the agencies think, 'dead men tell no tales.' Well, I'd gotten to know Chuck pretty well by then, and there was no way I could just let that happen."

Ellie picked up the wine and her glass, "Come on, let's get comfortable," she said, leading them to the couch. Sarah took the armchair. Devons sat on the couch, elbows on knees, leaning forward with his brow still scrunched up in concentration, Ellie curled up against him, sipping her wine with a slight smile.

"OK, so about the time you two got engaged, Chuck was nearly sent away, for his own safety. The bad guys were getting close."

"Oh-kaaaay, were they trying to kill him, or keep him safe?" asked Devon.

"At that stage, I'm pretty sure it was a bunker, to keep him safe. But once they have hold of him, and decide... Anyway, we started training Chuck. We didn't tell him why, he is Chuck after all. He'd freak out. But he figured it out for himself. He is Chuck, after all," she said, with a sad, yet proud smile. "We taught him the skills he'd need to keep off the grid, make fake identification, set up a safe house, all the things he'd need. Anyway, we received word that the new Int...new computer was almost ready. And Casey was most likely going to be given his orders that, or the next night."

"To kill my little brother."

"Yes, but that little brother of yours, he's a smart one. He'd already figured it out for himself, and he ran, just after I left him."

"You left Chuck with the man who was going to kill him?" Devon seemed to find that the way spies thought was a little confusing.

"Casey and I had discussed that. He knew how I felt for Chuck..."

"That you love him," Ellie emphasised.

"...And that I wasn't supposed to. So..." said Sarah in a quiet voice. She skipped over threatening Casey. The man knew what she would do to him if he hurt her Chuck. But Casey was a realist, he knew what was happening.

"Wait! You weren't _supposed_ to? But you two slept together! I gave Chuck a special booster shake."

Sarah's lips twitched at the memory, "Yeah... Poor Chuck," she whispered the last part, "He hated that, the lying I mean. See, that was all for cover. To keep him safe, to blend in and to have me nearby, boyfriend girlfriend was our best option."

"Only you fell for my brother."

Sarah nodded slightly. "So, Chuck ran that night. Casey thought he was with me, and I thought he was safe at home. But he'd already run. So a couple of days after Chuck ran, I took Ellie away from here, away from the cameras, and explained the situation. You took it about how I expected you too," she gave Ellie a frowny smile, and continued, "I knew that Chuck, being Chuck, would have left a message for you."

"Did that work? My voice mail?"

"Made me cry."

"Me too," whispered Ellie.

"And it made sure that the pair of you would be safe. Ellie and I staged a meeting in here, since the surveillance was still active, and I left to go find Chuck. He'd left a burner cell for me, the little shit did _that_ without my knowledge, and kept me informed. We'd time our raids to just miss him, but he was pretty damn good. Annnd the annoying little shit was waiting for me in my own place, back in DC," she finished with a proud exasperated smile.

Something filtered through Devon's head, "Wait! The money! We got a settlement on Chuck's insurance from the Buy More, it paid off our loans and here," Devon spread his hands to indicate the apartment.

Ellie broke it to her fiancée as gently as she could, "Honey, I blackmailed a General."

Devon reset his expression to its current default, 'bewilderment.'

Sarah sipped her wine, "While we were together in DC, we finalised the rest of his plan. Chuck had already figured out what we had. Casey and I had to kill him, he had to be seen to be dead, so he'd be free. And the timing would have to be right. Too soon, and they'd smell a rat. Too long, and we'd all be under suspicion. And there would need to be a grieving period. So we set it up where it would be on a security camera, Casey fired a blood capsule, Chuck collapses in my arms and I bawl my eyes out. Very dramatic," she closed her eyes and shook her head as she half smiled, but didn't mention how close to being real those tears had been at the time. "Ellie was able to provide us with a suitable doctor and a shooting victim to fake the autopsy, Chuck gave us his DNA sample, and Casey made the switch of the samples while I distracted the attendant. Used to mean, that meant flashing something. That's another thing Chuck's changed about me," she smiled at the thought of how much he'd changed her.

She skipped over fooling the psych evaluation, because aside from that one aspect of the man she loved still being alive, she wasn't lying to them.

"So, how soon?" Ellie wanted to know. A single expression flickered over Devon's face, and got stuck. He was beginning to wonder if he should go back to bed, and try climbing out the other side, to see if that improved things...

"Wednesday, Casey's looking after him. He's grumbling about Casey dragging him along when he goes running," Sarah smiled.

"Well, I certainly hope you'll introduce us to your new boyfriend."

"Uh... Well, it turns out that Sarah Irving is married... so..."

"Oh, no! You did _not_ marry my little brother without me there!" Had she have been standing, Surah suspected Ellie's fists would have been planted on her hips.

"Don't worry, I'm sure he'll want to renew our vows at some stage. After your wedding, I'm sure."

Sarah wasn't sure, but she thought Ellie muttered, '_Better,'_ under her breath.

That night, and the next three days and nights dragged interminably. On Wednesday, she'd had no contact with either Chuck or Casey. Two patrons, a pretty-boy actor named Matt Something and his boyfriend, left her dojo with bleeding noses before her assistant decided it would be safer for all concerned if Sarah did some paperwork, or belted the crap out of the heavy bag until closing time.

-o0o-

When she got home that night, her husband was waiting for her.

Her lights were on when she came home. That, and Ellie and Devon grinning blatantly out of their window was enough of a clue.

He was standing in the same room where they'd realised what was about to happen. She called his name, and he turned to face her, with that trademark grin that turned her knees to jelly.

And then he was holding her in his arms, almost crushing her. She decided she liked that feeling. After a few minutes, they surfaced for air, her lips now flushed almost red.

She smiled up at him, "Welcome home, Mister Irving."

"Does Mrs Irving always welcome her husband home like that?" he wanted to know.

"Mmm hmm. And he'd better get used to it."

"Somehow, I don't think that's going to be a problem for him."

"Aren't the pair of you _done_ yet?" groaned from somewhere further inside the apartment.

She rolled her eyes at Chuck and called out, "Thank you John!"

He came into the living room, looking distinctly uncomfortable. Neither Chuck nor Sarah had felt the urge to release each other yet. She glanced up at her new husband, and then asked Casey, "Are you the reason for his haircut? A number two comb is a bit short."

"Live with it, it'll grow back. Good to see you, Walker, you look better than the last time we saw you. Married life seems to agree with you."

She let the old name slide for the moment, and smiled back her former partner, "I'll let you know. Thank you for looking after him for me, while I got set up."

Casey grunted something small while he tried to shift a floor tile with one foot.

"I'm sorry, Casey, what was that?" asked Chuck with an evil grin. He only moved a little bit to use Sarah as a human shield.

There was a flash of the old Casey for an instant, before he gave a slight sheepish smile, "I said, he's not as bad as he used to be."

Chuck grinned hugely to the woman in his arms, "Don't you believe it. I'm still as annoying as ever."

"Ha!" barked Casey. "Yeah, that'll last," he said, miming cracking a whip.

Sarah didn't quite poke her tongue out at him.

Casey cleared his throat, "Well, before Ellie comes over here and bursts my eardrums, I'll get going. Chuck, that... that was some nice spy work. You two have a good life."

"What will you do?" asked Sarah.

"I, ah, I know a guy, owns an airline. I thought I might sit at the pointy end of a passenger jet for a while."

Chuck disengaged himself from Sarah. She went over to kiss him on the cheek, and Chuck held his hand out. As he shook his former handler's hand he said, "Thanks for everything, Casey. Even shooting me."

Casey gave them a small smile, "Anytime."

Shortly after Casey let himself out, his prediction came true. Ellie and Devon joined their new neighbours. Two days later, Chuck's ears still hurt.

-o0o-

**A.N. – **OK, so I probably waived my hands around too much and most of you seemed to have figured it out. Or even more likely, because I recycled a shorter story. Normally I reply to reviews a little more than I have with this one – I deliberately tried not to with this fic, as I didn't want to give away too much. Except, I told you at the beginning of chapter one... D'oh!


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